Anthony performs wonders of magic and illusion

Friday, August 10, 2018

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.Boardman librarian Mary Yee aided magician David Anthony in a trick at the Boardman library on July 16. Everyone thought that water previously poured into the cup would spill onto Yee's head after she tipped the glass over, but it had magically disappeared.

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.Magician and illusionist David Anthony posed with his assistants after the show at the Boardman library on July 16. A native of Cleveland, Anthony came to the library as part of the Summer Discovery program. He performs at various venues in the area throughout the year.

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.Two volunteers helped David Anthony perform a Houdini-style trick involving escaping from a set of handcuffs while having his hands tied within a bag. Anthony incorporated humor into the stunt by magically slipping into and out of the cuffs during the explanation prior to the trick.

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.For the final trick, magician and illusionist David Anthony's assistant climbed into a box into which rectangular tubes were then placed, filling the space within the box completely. The top and lower halves of the box were also separated from one another during the trick.

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.Magician and illusionist David Anthony made a bowling ball drop out of a seemingly empty paper bag. The bowling ball was later used in a juggling stunt.

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Neighbors | Natalie Wright.A young volunteer from the audience helped David Anthony perform a feat of magic involving the appearance of a yellow scarf tied between blue ones while inside of the volunteer's pocket. Only the blue scarves were present when they were placed into the pocket.

Families were wow-ed with a performance by magician and illusionist David Anthony on July 16 at the Boardman library.

Anthony began the show with a bang, dropping a weighty bowling ball from within a paper bag, seemingly from thin air. The bowling ball made an appearance later in the show in a juggling stunt involving Anthony juggling items of different weights and sizes with ease, something that is difficult for any juggler to do.

He pulled his first volunteer from the audience to help with a trick using scarves. He held up two blue scarves before balling the ends into one fist. He had his volunteer place them within his pocket. Anthony then held up a yellow scarf, ultimately making it vanish. At the completion of the trick, the volunteer pulled the balled up scarves from his pocket to find that the yellow scarf, which had vanished earlier in the trick, was now miraculously tied between them.

Anthony also displayed his skill at juggling. He began simply by juggling two, and then three, traditional juggling balls. He varied the act by incorporating different intricate patterns and moves, including spinning while juggling. It wasn’t long before a fourth and fifth ball were added to the routine. He moved on to juggle four hoops and three clubs, respectively.

Juggling styles can easily be varied, Anthony noted, by using single or double spins in between catching the items you are juggling.

Anthony pulled two volunteers to the front of the room to help him do a Houdini-style escape using handcuffs and a bag. To the amusement of the audience, he made a show of going from within to outside of the handcuffs, seemingly in the span of a second, while him hands were in the bag. He continued to ask his volunteers to check the locks and the cuffs while pointing or gesturing at something without them in the next moment.

The next trick went back to juggling, this time with much higher stakes - a set of three machetes.

The key to juggling, according to Anthony, is practice. The more practice you give to something, the better you will get at it. Anthony said this is truth whether it’s reading, math, science or magic.

Two more volunteers helped him do a card trick. Each volunteer counted out 10 cards from a deck and went to opposite sides of the room. Anthony then instructed one of the volunteers to “throw” three imaginary cards from their hand to the other volunteer. Each volunteer counted out the cards in their hand to find that the imaginary cards had passed through the air and one volunteer magically had 13 cards while the other only had seven.

Boardman librarian Mary Yee also participated in a magic trick, alongside Anthony. He filled two cups with water and asked Yee to hold it on her head. The pair spun around once, waved their hands over the audience and then over their cups, and then upended to cups over their heads. The trick got a huge laugh because Anthony had secretly drunk the water out of his cup, out of Yee’s view, but within view of the audience. Everyone thought Yee was going to spill the water on herself, and no one was more surprised than Yee when nothing came out of the cup.

Anthony even taught the audience how to do an illusion. He held a card with black dots in different places on it, similar to a playing card. He explained that you could trick an audience’s mind into believing there were more numbers shown on the card than there actually were by manipulating the placement of your hand by either covering a dot or covering a place where a dot should be that is blank. The twist at the end of the illusion involved even more dots appearing on the card than when he originally explained the trick, and in places where it would have been impossible for his hand to cover.

The final trick was a spin on a classic magical feat. Anthony’s assistant climbed into a magician’s box, disappearing within so that only one hand was visible. Anthony inserted two rectangular tubes into the box so that the box was filled. He even separated the upper and lower halves of the box. Despite this, the assistant was whole and well when Anthony opened the box at the end of the trip.

Anthony, a native of Cleveland, visited the library as part of the Summer Reading Program. A display of books on magic and illusions was available for interested children to learn more. At the end of the event, almost all of the books had been checked out of the library.

Anthony first became interested in magic and illusions when he received his first magic kit at the age of 5. He has been performing for audiences since he was 11-years-old.

He said he was first drawn to magic by the sense of wonder he got when watching and learning about the tricks.

“A sense of wonder. I think that’s what draws adults to it too,” he said. “It’s the same sense of wonder that children get when they see snow for the first time. As adults, we don’t get a lot of that, but we do with magic.”

Anthony said that in the past three months he has made around 65 performances for children at various local venues.

His favorite trick is one in which he levitates ones of his assistants, and he has earned international awards performing the feat.

More information on David Anthony can be found on his website at www.danthonymagic.com and on various social media platforms by searching for danthonymagic.

For more information on upcoming events at the Boardman library and other library locations in the Public Library of Youngstown and Mahoning Valley system, visit libraryvisit.org.